bummed out (and whining about it)

I got my fancy scanner Friday, got home from work eager to scan
some of my best slides, learn a little about photoshop and generally
mess around with it between unpacking chores we still have left
to do...

I put the computer desk together (which counted as a unpacking chore)
read some of the scanner manuals (messing around)
found all the computer parts and put it together (two birds, one task)
broke down and put some of the empty boxes out in the garage (doesn't
sound like much to you, but you didn't have 390+ boxes in your house last
monday, did you?, unpacking chore)
meanwhile, booted up the computer...and the downward spiral began...
computer wasn't quite working right, incredibly slow.
So I wiped out all the programs the kids have added over the four years
or so we've had it, ran spybot etc.
computer got slower...
"How slow?" you ask...
it would take an hour to boot up, maybe 3-4 minutes to show me the
"start" menu after clicking on it.

So I thought about it (can't remember the chores at this point...I think
it was hanging pictures, or maybe the bird cage in the atrium)
and said (in my head), "well I'll just format the drive, go back to the
factory settings, the original software, wipe EVERYTHING bye bye and
start over. It took a LONG time, and when the little XP man started
talking at 2 am Sat morning about a tour of XP, Elesa almost hit her head
on the ceiling.

In the morning (Sat) it was even slower.
I won't bore you anymore with a blow by blow, as to what was
tried, done, not done, checked, run etc.
Suffice it to say that in the end (if I am at an end???)
Saturday evening, I decided to run chkdsk figuring it can't be software
because by now I've pretty much wiped everything out.
I started chkdsk well over 24 hrs ago...its still running...

Elesa is sympathetic, "if you can't get it working right, buy a new one".
(as a guy, I gotta love that attitude (and her!)).
Still, something ain't right with the world when dad has to ask to
borrow the kids' computers. And ultimately, I'm bummed because
all the time I've spent trying to just get the computer running should
have been spent playing with my new scanner.

Now another work week is starting, and I have neither, I'm bummed
and I'm whining.